I've seen the Raging Bull and everything and his actual fight film and there's one thing that gets me. Why is he portrayed as a powerful puncher? His KO ratio is very low for the number of fights he had. I know how he was controlled by the Mob. Did they give him orders to carry fighters throughout a fight and not KO him?
Jake LaMotta was not a powerful puncher, but he was always in the face of an opponent. attacking and never letting up. Simular to an early Duran. Occasionally he would get the knockout, but mostly he would weardown his opponent and go to a decision. LaMotta was not Controlled by the Mob. If you pay closer attention to the Movie. His lack of cooperation was the reason he did not get a title shot years earlier. In order to finally get a title shot he had to cooperate with the Mob for ONE fight against Billy Fox. He threw that fight so the Mob could bet against him and win alot of Money. Then about a year later when everything died down. LaMotta got his title shot as promised against Marcel Cerdan.
i dont know about not being a hard puncher. watch the cerdan title fight and at the end jake and cerdans handler have to help hold cerdan up as jake walks him around the ring with his arm raised. he looked pretty beat up and out of it to me.
just watrched lamotta-murphy II and it looked like jake could hit pretty hard to me he really rocked murphy
Jake could hit, He dropped Robinson and stopped Cerdan and others, There were so many good fighter in top condition in those days with experience in the ring and gyms, It was compettitve but Jake was a Bull...He was shunned by the mob because he was not controlled by them, they reached his brother for the Fox DIVe then they allowed him to get a shot but the win over Cerdan was a legit win. The mob just removed the block...like King did in the 80's and 90's
he wasn't into the power game but he was an accumalitive puncher ...and he'd catch you from odd angles lungeing in the way he did ... lamotta used to beat the **** out of the mob and send them packing whenever they'd **** around with him .. in his book he states when he was about 17 him and a friend held up a mafia dice game with one gun ... made all these made men and **** line up agianst the walll .. at one point one of them mouthes off and lamotta bashes his head with the gun ... the rest just keep quiet and proceed to get ripped off blind by a very VERY green lamotta lmao dude wasn't normal by any stretch of the imagination
Jake was a decent puncher ... let's keep in mind two things... the first is that for most of his career he killed himself to make weight and that drains a fighter. He was a natural 168 pounder in an era without a 168 pound division ... secondly he fought an exceptional level of opposition. He fought all the tough black fighters of his era that many white and black fighters ducked. LaMotta is under rated today . He was a very talented, terrific fighter.
Whilst I agree with you that Jake was a cracking fighter, and one of the few to step up and take on some of the guys on the black murderers row, but he ducked Burley and didn't take on Williams until Holman was close to washed up...Williams pushed him hard.
Yea but he stopped Bob Satterfield and Satterfield KO'd Cleveland "BIG CAT" WILLIAMS and KO"d Heavyweight Bob Baker in 1 and Had Big Nino Valdez on the floor for a 9count in the last rd of a UD..you cant fight everyone but Lamotta had no fear of anyone
agian i see truth in this also ... with a record like lamotta its hard to blame a guy for ducking...he fought a list of whose who
